Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Implications' and 'talk'

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4 ideas

1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 3. Philosophy Defined
Even pointing a finger should only be done for a reason [Epictetus]
     Full Idea: Philosophy says it is not right even to stretch out a finger without some reason.
     From: Epictetus (fragments/reports [c.57], 15)
     A reaction: The key point here is that philosophy concerns action, an idea on which Epictetus is very keen. He rather despise theory. This idea perfectly sums up the concept of the wholly rational life (which no rational person would actually want to live!).
1. Philosophy / H. Continental Philosophy / 6. Deconstruction
Deconstructing philosophy gives the history of concepts, and the repressions behind them [Derrida]
     Full Idea: To 'deconstruct' philosophy would be to think the structured genealogy of philosophy's concepts, but at the same time determine what this history has been able to dissimulate or forbid, making itself into history by this motivated repression.
     From: Jacques Derrida (Implications [1967], p.5)
     A reaction: All of this type of philosophy is motivated by what I think of as (I'm afraid!) a rather adolescent belief that we are all being 'repressed', and that somehow, if we think hard enough, we can all become 'free', and then everything will be fine.
The movement of 'différance' is the root of all the oppositional concepts in our language [Derrida]
     Full Idea: The movement of 'différance', as that which produces different things, that which differentiates, is the common root of all the oppositional concepts that mark our language, such as sensible/intelligible, intuition/signification, nature/culture etc.
     From: Jacques Derrida (Implications [1967], p.7)
     A reaction: 'Différance' is a word coined by Derrida, and his most famous concept. At first glance, the concept of a thing which is the source of all differentiation sounds like a fiction.
14. Science / C. Induction / 3. Limits of Induction
Maybe induction is only reliable IF reality is stable [Mitchell,A]
     Full Idea: Maybe we should say that IF regularities are stable, only then is induction a reliable procedure.
     From: Alistair Mitchell (talk [2006]), quoted by PG - Db (ideas)
     A reaction: This seems to me a very good proposal. In a wildly unpredictable reality, it is hard to see how anyone could learn from experience, or do any reasoning about the future. Natural stability is the axiom on which induction is built.